Subscriber-to-Administrator escalation via unchecked role assignment
Published Aug 1, 2026 · Updated Aug 1, 2026
Privilege escalation in Pronamic Pay 10.1.0 and earlier allows remote authenticated users to promote their WordPress accounts to Administrator. The maybe_update_user_role function passes an attacker-controlled Gravity Forms role field directly to WP_User::set_role without an allowlist, capability comparison, or permission check. A Subscriber account is sufficient, but an administrator must first enable Update User Role on a Pronamic Pay payment feed and map it to a form field.
Summary
What happened
Privilege escalation in Pronamic Pay 10.1.0 and earlier allows remote authenticated users to promote their WordPress accounts to Administrator. The maybe_update_user_role function passes an attacker-controlled Gravity Forms role field directly to WP_User::set_role without an allowlist, capability comparison, or permission check. A Subscriber account is sufficient, but an administrator must first enable Update User Role on a Pronamic Pay payment feed and map it to a form field.
The record
- CVE
- CVE-2026-16635
- Published
- Aug 1, 2026
- Updated
- Aug 1, 2026
- Vendor
- Pronamic
- Product
- Pronamic Pay
- Classifications
- CWE-269, T1068
- Attack vector
- network
- Privileges
- authenticated
Timeline
How it unfolded
- Aug 1, 2026CVE publishedPublication date reported by the CVE source.
- Aug 1, 2026Record updatedLatest update available in the CVE record.
Exploitability
Present is not the same as exploitable
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Is a vulnerable build present?
Compare these published version ranges with your installed build and any vendor patches.
- Affected versionversion=0 <=10.1.0
What conditions does exploitation require?
What is affected?
Published CVSS scores
CVSS describes severity. EPSS estimates exploitation probability.
Attacks
What attackers are doing with it
Daily unique IPs observed by Shadowserver honeypots for known exploited vulnerabilities (KEVs). Missing observations do not establish an absence of attacks.
Weakness, pattern, technique
Public exploit references
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Technologies
Your stack
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Your stack
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